BELGIAN justice minister Koen Geens said he felt personally responsible for Tuesday’s bloody terrorist attack in the Belgian city of Liege, saying that the victims’ death would weigh heavily on his conscience.

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Prime Minister Charles Michel admitted that Mr Herman, who had an extensive criminal record that included theft, assault, and drug offences, had left the prison unsupervised despite appearing in three reports on radicalism.

The gunman reportedly shouted “Allahu Akbar” – “God is greatest” in Arabic – during the attack and had been in contact with radical Islamists in jail in 2016 and early 2017. He was however considered to be more of a fringe figure and not influential.

Federal prosecutors, for their part, said that there was evidence that they were dealing with “terrorist murder,” adding that Mr Herman appeared to have responded to online calls from the terrorist group Islamic State (ISIS) to stab police officers and use their service weapons to cause carnage.

ISIS have since claimed responsibility for the attack.

There are signs he was radicalised in prison but is it that radicalisation which drove him to commit these acts?

Mr Jambon

The country’s Interior Minister, Jan Jambon, told Bel RTL radio on Wednesday that Mr Herman was also behind the murder of his former cellmate, Michael Wilmet, who was bludgeoned to death on Monday night.

Mr Jambon said: “There are signs he was radicalised in prison but is it that radicalisation which drove him to commit these acts?

“It could have been because he had nothing to look forward to, because he also killed someone the night before, the guy’s psychology and the fact, it seems, he may have been on drugs.”

But the brutal attack has revived fears of lone-wolf attacks in Europe, namely in neighbouring France.

Louis Aliot, vice-president of France’s far-right Front National party, told France Inter radio that Europe would “never be able to prevent” small-scale terrorist attacks like the one that hit Liege, and could only strive to “make it more difficult” for radical Islamists to launch attacks on European soil.